The goal is for the baseball clubhouse to be pristinely clean every time the Norfolk Tides come into it, with their laundry done and food ready to eat. Oh, and for nobody ever to see the guys in charge, called "clubbies," doing any work.

"My goal is for them to come in and think only about baseball, not where their hat is or where their bats are or anything like that," said Scotty Haulter, the head clubhouse manager for the Tides.

"My satisfaction comes from them just being able to concentrate on baseball."

It's a process that requires precise time management, infinite patience and incredible organization. There isn't a whole lot of reward for doing it well, but the guys who pull it off take a ton of pride in the job they do.

Haulter is in charge of the home-side clubhouse along with several other responsibilities. He has an assistant, Greg Porter, and another person who manages the visitors' clubhouse.

Days are long, with a night's sleep usually consisting of four or five hours tops, and the only break comes when the Tides are on the road. Even then there are bigger projects, and round-the-clock possibilities for work.

Turnover is frequent and employment is seasonal on a year-by-year basis. Haulter, 45, is in his first season with the Tides and his third in baseball.

He previously worked in the music business, spending the last eight of his 20 years in it as tour manager for Smash Mouth. He said he got burned out and had always had a desire to be involved with baseball.

After one season with the Frontier League's independent baseball team in Rockford, Ill., he worked last season as one of several assistants in the Colorado Rockies clubhouse. Those experiences helped him go from having no idea how to do the job to figuring out the best ways to get everything done.

Haulter's cell phone rings constantly as he coordinates numerous layers of planning. He manages the batboys, all the equipment orders and maintenance and day-to-day clubhouse cleanup, laundry and food.

His only break appears to be the time he spends outside the clubhouse burning through two packs of cigarettes a day. His attitude is positive as he describes a process fans never see.

Clubbies are paid a salary, which ranges from $5,000 a season at the independent level to $80,000 in the major leagues, but also receive small tips from players for various services. Players also pay clubhouse dues, all of which are used to pay for food and supplies, Haulter said.

Some players make more than others thus causing some to tip more than others at the Tides' level, which at Triple A is a step down from the major leagues.

"My big thing is to never do anything solely for the tip," Haulter said. "We're the concierge for these players and whatever they need, we should get it."

There are few requests, and for the most part players don't ask for anything special. But it's still a priority to make them feel comfortable and at home.

"A good clubbie should know what they want," Haulter said. "A good clubbie should be able to overhear: 'Oh, I'd like that' and then have it for them before they ever come to you and say: 'Hey how come we don't have this?'

"A lot of it is getting to know the people. And there's 30 different personalities in this room."

Haulter said at the major league level players sometimes asked him to take their vehicle to get it washed or to pick up their dry cleaning, but there's nothing like that with the Tides.

The biggest daily job is the laundry, cleaning and cooking for 30 people. Haulter and Porter do a complicated dance of picking up responsibilities together or separately, depending upon what needs to be completed first.

"The faster we get it done, the faster we get out of there," Porter said.

In a 24-hour period, an average of seven or eight loads of laundry pass through one or the other of two washing machines and one dryer on the premises. Likewise Haulter has to plan menus, order food and see that it's cooked for three meals a day.

He also is in charge of scheduling batboys, using four of the six total for each home game, and ordering all the team's equipment. The bulk of that takes place before the season.

Clubbies vacuum and clean the clubhouse three times a day, tidying it up and emptying all the trash cans every time the players leave for the field. The clubhouse is the size of three large living rooms combined, with lockers around three sides and several couches in front of a TV up front.

The biggest mess is on rainy days when players are tracking mud in and out all day long.